MLB Stadium Saga: Oakland/Tampa Bay/Southside

[GhostOfNormMacdonald]

  All this talk of suburbs fighting for stadium rights makes me really glad the Twikings/Vins ditched Bloomington for downtown MPLS. I'm a 10 minute bikeride away from Target Field, and they have a place to store a bike.

 

Needing to go to an entirely different suburb would suck.

[The_Admiral]

Yeah, I love what Minneapolis has been doing to be just a little less car-centric (tall order for a metro with so much pure 1960s suburbia), and I particularly love what they did with Target Field and the U's stadium. I don't care for The Anvil That Kills Birds, which was a waste of public money when the Vikings could have just gone back outside (those two years they spent there were great, and even made their tenure official by blowing a playoff game late). I hope the one Super Bowl was worth it.

 

 

[chcarlson23]

5 hours ago, The_Admiral said:

Yeah, I love what Minneapolis has been doing to be just a little less car-centric (tall order for a metro with so much pure 1960s suburbia), and I particularly love what they did with Target Field and the U's stadium. I don't care for The Anvil That Kills Birds, which was a waste of public money when the Vikings could have just gone back outside (those two years they spent there were great, and even made their tenure official by blowing a playoff game late). I hope the one Super Bowl was worth it.

 

 

Minneapolis is now apparently the most bike-able city in the US. It’s definitely cool to see a big city try to take steps to make it a more welcoming city to be in. (The suburbs are a whole other mess with a lot of them having the opposite priority, a la Blaine, Woodbury, even the beloved Maple Grove.)

 

St. Paul isn’t half bad when it comes to biking but certainly falls behind. But they are numbers 2 and 3 in park systems rankings across the US, only falling behind DC. About 99% of people living in the two, are within a 10 minute walk of a park, and often a park that has really nice amenities, like playgrounds, trails, benches, and other nice stuff. I currently live about 5 minutes away from 2 and probably another 5 from at least 4 more 

[GhostOfNormMacdonald]

 I like US Bank, but I agree that we just should have built an open stadium. We can do all the kitschy faux-Scandi stuff to decorate the stadium, it doesn't need to be the WHOLE stadium

[Digby]

My thing with US Bank Stadium is that having a giant domed stadium downtown like that is just hideous. It's ugly on the city skyline and it feels like a downtown dead zone, even though it's not surrounded by a sea of parking. Those are the one genre of stadium that I'm fine with keeping in the burbs or city outskirts. Arenas, baseball, soccer, even some college stadiums can fit much more neatly and naturally into the urban fabric.

 

I will say that while I am by no means a "bike guy", I find myself biking or scootering everywhere when in Minneapolis, so mission accomplished. Not bad for a city covered in ice 6 months a year.

[BBTV]

12 hours ago, The_Admiral said:

I hope the one Super Bowl was worth it.

 

It was. 

 

[GhostOfNormMacdonald]

    I guess I will be the 10th dentist and say I like it in the skyline. The MPLS skyline looks so good from so many angles for a city of it's size, and I find myself admiring US Bank whenever I'm driving in from the north or east. It looks like a futuristic Stave church, which fits the glass and steel faux-Scandi vibe of MPLS. I'd prefer an open stadium, but not because of how it looks in the skyline   

[OnWis97]

9 hours ago, chcarlson23 said:

Minneapolis is now apparently the most bike-able city in the US. It’s definitely cool to see a big city try to take steps to make it a more welcoming city to be in. (The suburbs are a whole other mess with a lot of them having the opposite priority, a la Blaine, Woodbury, even the beloved Maple Grove.)

 

St. Paul isn’t half bad when it comes to biking but certainly falls behind. But they are numbers 2 and 3 in park systems rankings across the US, only falling behind DC. About 99% of people living in the two, are within a 10 minute walk of a park, and often a park that has really nice amenities, like playgrounds, trails, benches, and other nice stuff. I currently live about 5 minutes away from 2 and probably another 5 from at least 4 more 

I live in St. Paul and we're doing pretty well, too. I bike about 120 miles a week (weather permitting, of course) from just north of downtown. I have nearly limitless access to miles...of course a lot of those miles are suburban (and when I cross the US 52 Bridge, I take a couple of routes in surprisingly well-covered Dakota County). It's not quite up to MPLS standards but it's doing OK for itself. That all said, I have no experience attempting the suburbs you mention.

 

In any case, particular to the sporting arena subject, the Minnesota teams are doing far better than the good old days of the Met and the Met Center (both of which I am old enough to have gone to, though barely old enough to remember the former). Biking to Target Field/Center can be done from almost anywhere and while I generally agree with the Admiral on the Vikings Stadium in terms of bilking the taxpayers (though I think the aforementioned playoff choke being in dangerous cold points to playing indoors as a good idea), it's outrageously accessible. It's probably a bit less comfortable to bike the Xcel Center (never done it; have walked) but doable for the experienced rider, anyway.

 

3 hours ago, GhostOfNormMacdonald said:

 I like US Bank, but I agree that we just should have built an open stadium. We can do all the kitschy faux-Scandi stuff to decorate the stadium, it doesn't need to be the WHOLE stadium

I think it's a bit overrated in that almost any ranking from both known publications and randos has it top-5; frequently #1. It's tacky from the outside. The concourses are gray and don't seem to have improved on the Metrodome significantly in terms of actually moving people through. The big opening doors are nice, the purple seats are great (compared to the sterile blue of the Dome), and the viewing is great. But is it the best  venue in the NFL? Hell no. Is it top 5? Heck no.

[GDAWG]

3 hours ago, BBTV said:

 

It was. 

 

 

Only one of two QB's to defeat Tom Brady in a Super Bowl.  Also, Brady is the only one so far to defeat Patrick Mahomes in a Super Bowl.  

[spartacat_12]

4 hours ago, GhostOfNormMacdonald said:

 I like US Bank, but I agree that we just should have built an open stadium. We can do all the kitschy faux-Scandi stuff to decorate the stadium, it doesn't need to be the WHOLE stadium

 

Pretty sure the Vikings wanted to build an open stadium, but the state would only agree to provide public funding if they built an indoor facility that could be used for the Super Bowl, Final Four, etc.

[BBTV]

More details on NJ's offer for the Sixers.  I'm a little confused as to the financing, but it sounds like it'd still be privately financed, BUTTTTTT, NJ could/would provide $1.3B of credits and bonds.

 

https://www.crossingbroad.com/2024/09/sixers-owners-man-card-in-jeopardy-as-team-takes-new-jersey-arena-proposal-seriously.html

 

Officials from the state of New Jersey sent details to the owners of the Philadelphia 76ers regarding an opportunity to use state-owned land in Camden for a massive mixed-use development that would include a world-class arena as well as commercial, residential and retail offerings, ROI-NJ has learned.

 

The multibillion-dollar project, championed by Gov. Phil Murphy and supported by the Legislature, would be built on the former state prison site area that is adjacent to the Delaware River and north of the Ben Franklin Bridge.

 

The project, which would be self-financed by Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment (the entity that owns the Sixers), would be eligible for hundreds of millions of dollars in tax incentives.

 

Because the project would contain both an arena and a full-scale mixed-use component, HBSE could be eligible to receive two Aspire tax credits worth up to $400 million each.

 

In addition, the Governor’s Office aims to work with the Legislature to enable the structuring of up to $500 million of special-purpose bonds supported by fees and surcharges on tickets, concessions and parking (meaning there will be no impact to New Jersey taxpayers) to support the development of an arena.

[The_Admiral]

I can't get over the fact that it's Camden. This is like when the Bears tried to move to Gary.

[FiddySicks]

Not knowing anything about the dynamics of how things work in that area I have a question. 
 

Is this going to be like a 49ers situation where they’re not in the city they’re named after but nobody cares, or is like an Angels situation where most people don’t care that they don’t play in the city they’re named after, but enough will to make it a headache? 
 

Like, we’re not gonna get the Philadelphia 76ers of Camden, NJ, are we? 

[GhostOfNormMacdonald]

The NJ Nets ceasing to exist only for the New Jersey 76ers to become a thing would be proof we live in the most cursed timeline

[BBTV]

32 minutes ago, FiddySicks said:

Not knowing anything about the dynamics of how things work in that area I have a question. 
 

Is this going to be like a 49ers situation where they’re not in the city they’re named after but nobody cares, or is like an Angels situation where most people don’t care that they don’t play in the city they’re named after, but enough will to make it a headache? 
 

Like, we’re not gonna get the Philadelphia 76ers of Camden, NJ, are we? 

 

Our aquarium is in Camden, and our larger outdoor concert venue is in Camden.  As for naming, it'd certainly stay Philadelphia and nobody would care other than the same dopes that complain about the NY Giants / Jets.

 

In the mid '90s when they were actually signed on the dotted line to move there, they were going to remain Philadelphia (though remove "Philadelphia" from the top of the waterfall jerseys.)  Then the Flyers bought them to have them fill dates in the new arena and tore up whatever papers were in place for Camden.

[Luigi74]

15 hours ago, FiddySicks said:

Not knowing anything about the dynamics of how things work in that area I have a question. 
 

Is this going to be like a 49ers situation where they’re not in the city they’re named after but nobody cares, or is like an Angels situation where most people don’t care that they don’t play in the city they’re named after, but enough will to make it a headache? 
 

Like, we’re not gonna get the Philadelphia 76ers of Camden, NJ, are we? 

People will joke about it but ultimately not care, the arena would be directly across the river from Philly and I think actually closer to Center City than their current arena.

[GhostOfNormMacdonald]

The Philadelphia 1776ers of New Jersey has a certain horrific ring to it

[BBTV]

Plot twist: the Sixers are “altering the deal” to say that despite their claim of asking for $0 public money, they want a clause that says that if ANY arena built in the city gets public dollars, then they get a payment for the same amount of public money. 
 

I don’t think arenas should get public dollars, but this could be a poison pill because it ensures that NO future arena can get any public money because that money would essentially be double. It’s not likely that a new arena will be built within the next 20 years, but to me, this was a plan the whole time so that they can now guarantee that they won’t be approved but still say “hey we tried… see ya”. 

[BBTV]

2 hours ago, Luigi74 said:

People will joke about it but ultimately not care, the arena would be directly across the river from Philly and I think actually closer to Center City than their current arena.

closer (maybe… center city is big) but farther away, both for most city residents due to needing PATCO or ferry, and to a sizable portion of the suburban base. Plus tolls. 

[FiddySicks]

Rumblings, from Scott Boras of all people, that the A’s to Sac may disintegrate in the next few days. More to come, I would assume.